States seeking a higher education but
even as a freshman I had bought into
this piece of the culture here that
centers around work and passion the
notion that marrying these two together
could somehow callus the rigor of hard
work seemed like the perfect remedy to
get through my 8 a.m. math classes this
became so weaved in my fabric that it
manifested itself into how I chose my
class says what events I chose to go to
even now in my professional life it
still haunts me that I never ever
considered the opposite of this could I
just simply start doing something and
then learn to love it my name is Robert
Managua and today I’m going to I am from
Tanzania East Africa and today I’m going
to share with you some stories from home
that help answer this question
so in my latest trip home I met a young
lady called Bridget now Bridget not too
long ago I was scouring the supermarkets
looking for her favorite canola oil she
couldn’t find what she was looking for
at the price she was looking for and so
she did what any of us would do if we
don’t find the olive oil we’re looking
for at Publix you start your own edible
oils manufacturing plants this is what
she did and one question that helped set
her apart from her competition was why
in the country that we have all these
raw materials why do we charge so much
for a bottle of edible oils and so she
went out she talked to these farmers and
then she found out that it it’s because
of middlemen so middlemen would go into
these rural areas they would talk to
these farmers they would buy all this
raw material but they would put it in
storage until there was a scarcity for
that raw material and then they would
flood it into the market to command the
highest price now this brought about two
problems one the farmers didn’t get paid
until that happened and the second was
there’s post harvest waste so as you’re
storing all these sunflower seeds and
the like they get spoiled in storage and
so what she did is she took all these
farmers and put them together in a
cooperative because they’re so displaced
as they are right now and by putting
them in a cooperative now they’re
legally recognized they have access to
traditional forms of funding and they
command more respect in the marketplace
but because of this she was able to get
the raw material she was seeking for at
the lowest price and today her average
product the price of our average product
is about one point eight dollars per
liter and the next best alternative is
about four to five dollars per liter
and by doing this she’s able to affect
about 200 farmers currently this number
is set to grow to about 600 by 2020
these are people now that can go back
and take their kids to school and
further their individual businesses
because of this she’s able to reduce the
post-harvest waste by about 80 percent
and this is just on sunflower seeds
alone another entity I ran into is M TL
m TL is the leading mining consulting
company in Tanzania and together with
the Fairtrade organization they work to
make small-scale artisanal miners
Fairtrade certified these does this does
a couple of things for these small-scale
miners one they’re able to make more
money because when you’re Fairtrade
certified you command about a 13 percent
price premium for your products it
communicates to the consumer that the
products you’re buying are coming from a
place where the working conditions are
safe and sanitary and humane and most
importantly there are not conflict
minerals and as well in the sector like
mining where they can use cyanide or
mercury in the extraction process of
gold for example there are taught ways
that they can handle this in a way that
does not affect them nor does it the
environment and so while speaking to one
of the miners I asked him well take me
through one of your days what do you do
on a day to day basis and so she said
okay there’s the mine and you would you
would go in with Dynamite’s because you
need to you need to blast the rock and
then get that residue and then try and
extract the gold from it so you place
the dynamite so you walk out you have
about four to five minutes until
detonation and then you have to wait
about an hour for the dust to settle and
it’s someone’s job to go back after the
dust is settled and inspect the roof of
the mined for any loose Rock
so that when everyone goes inside it
doesn’t collapse on anyone that’s
someone’s job it’s inconceivable to even
ask them if this is what they were
passion
about getting into it lastly I went to
the northern part of Tanzania in a place
called Bukoba which is where I’m
originally from and here we have a
staple food it’s a protein it’s more
delicious than chicken than beef than
any source of meat that you can think of
I’ll let you guys try to think of what
that might be
grasshoppers exactly yeah ha now before
it it looks so appetizing let’s see what
happens before this
this is how they would look like before
they were fried or cooked in any form
and this is such it’s a it’s not only a
seasonal thing it’s also regional things
so it’s only found in that northern part
of Tanzania and this is what the setup
looks like to actually catch the live
grasshoppers so after we get over the
fact that it resembles something like a
medieval torture device there is
actually a lot of brilliance in this
setup let’s look at it so first there’s
the light that light attracts the
grasshoppers because they’re seeking
warmth and then next there’s all this
smoke and they’re stoking fire for the
smoke to go up and it disorients the
grasshoppers and so they hit into these
that’s where the fire is stoking and
then the smoke is going up and then
after they’re disoriented and hit these
iron sheets they slide all the way down
into these buckets that you see here and
then from this is what you get these
scrumptious grasshoppers
now the the people that do this faced a
lot of challenges one of them is they
cannot control what but they do get they
will get the edible kind they will get
the beetles that have the corrosive
material in them and a plethora of
others so they hacked actually have to
go in and sift through to make sure what
they have is what they they’re looking
at yet now through this process when you
come into the insects that are actually
more that have that corrosive material
it can it can lead to dermatitis of the
skin and so forth the lights that they
use are really really bright that’s
tearing in them while you’re making this
thing go on all night can be very very
taxing for your eyes and not to mention
the smoke as well and so again why is
this person telling you all this
information in such a passionate manner
through all these three different
stories some of them were from necessity
some of them bore out of circumstance
but the one thing that was for sure is
they both learned to love what they do
one is because they found a positive
relationship between effort and reward
and so the more they did the more they
got rewarded the second thing was every
single one had an altruistic twist to it
with the edible oils the success of
Aubry her company is directly correlated
to the success of the farmers she’s in
business with with the mining people all
these small-scale miners that would
otherwise have no say in the marketplace
all of a sudden are able to contribute
more than they would have been before
even if this this project is not a
revenue generator for the company but
it’s a way to give back for to these
small-scale miners and lastly with these
grasshoppers apart from providing my
dinner every single day when I go to
bukoba
this is a read this is the identity of
this place when they travel anywhere
else in the country although or the
continent for that matter they’re able
to say this is home everyone in that
region partakes it partakes enlists in
one way or another maybe they capture
the grasshoppers are they they cook them
they sell them they consume them but
because this is so regional they’re able
to identify themselves with this it’s a
matter of pride and so don’t looking for
what you’re passionate about and then
diving into work to work on it is not
the only way you can learn to love and
be passionate about what you do if you
find that in whatever you do if you get
that relationship between hard work and
reward you just have to like something
just enough to start doing it and after
that have have an altruistic motive to
it who did you impact what other
stakeholders are you able to make their
professional or personal lives better
because of you doing what you do
and I hope that we take this into
consideration next time we think of our
passion [Applause]